‘Digital arrest’ scam exposed: SIMBOX racket linked with China, Cambodia, Pakistan busted; Rs 100 crore fraud probed

NEW DELHI: Delhi Police busted a transnational cybercrime syndicate that used illegal SIMBOX technology to defraud citizens across India, arresting 7 accused, including a Taiwanese national and a woman, with links to Chinese, Cambodian, and Pakistani scam networks.

The accused were identified as Parvinder Singh (38), Shashi Prasad (53), I-Tsung Chen (30), Sarbdeep Singh (33), Jaspreet Kaur (28), Abdus Salam (33), and Dinesh K (30). They are residents of Delhi, Mumbai, Taiwan, and Punjab.


According to police, the racket was operational since September last year. Victims were contacted by callers impersonating Anti-Terrorist Squad (ATS) officials and falsely accused of having links to terror incidents such as the Pahalgam attack and the Delhi blasts. They were threatened with immediate arrest and coerced into transferring money under extreme psychological pressure, a method investigators described as a “digital arrest” scam.

During the investigation, officers found that the fraud calls were deliberately routed through low-frequency 2G networks to evade real-time location tracking. The syndicate deployed illegal SIMBOX systems to mask international calls as domestic Indian numbers. Though the calls appeared to originate from India, they were actually placed from abroad—primarily Cambodia—and routed into the Indian telecom network through clandestine SIMBOX installations.

Investigators also discovered that the SIMBOX devices were manipulated by overwriting and rotating IMEI numbers, making device identification extremely difficult. Advanced software merged multiple SIMBOX units into a single virtual system, dynamically rotating IMEIs and SIM numbers. As a result, call detail records showed the same number originating from multiple cities in a single day, deliberately misleading law enforcement agencies.

DCP (IFSO) Vineet Kumar constituted a special team that arrested Shashi Prasad, custodian of a Delhi-based SIMBOX setup, and Parvinder Singh, an active facilitator. The duo operated from 5 locations across Delhi, knowingly enabling international cyber fraud operations targeting Indian citizens.

Further investigation led to the arrest of I-Tsung Chen, a Taiwanese national, at Delhi’s international airport. Police identified Chen as the principal operational backbone of the syndicate, responsible for smuggling and configuring SIMBOX devices in India. Interrogation revealed he was a key operative of a Taiwan-based organised crime network allegedly led by gangster Shang Min Wu, with a history of kidnapping, financial fraud, and money laundering across countries.

Analysis of the Delhi setup revealed additional SIMBOX hubs in Mohali, Punjab, leading to the arrest of Sarbdeep Singh and Jaspreet Kaur (woman). Both previously worked in Cambodia-based scam centres and were allegedly recruited and directed by a Pakistani handler who funded and controlled SIMBOX installations in India.

The probe later uncovered attempts to install SIMBOX setups in Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu, and Malad, Mumbai, resulting in further arrests of Dinesh K (Diploma in Hotel Management) and Abdus Salam (33, Diploma in Civil Engineering). Dinesh undertook multiple foreign trips to Vietnam, Thailand, Malaysia, and Cambodia, suspected to coordinate with cryptocurrency facilitators and financial handlers for laundering extorted funds.

Interrogation revealed an international command-and-control structure behind the “digital arrest” scam, with Indian operations forming only the last link. The accused remained in contact with a former Delhi-based operator who earlier masterminded SIMBOX setups in Narela and Nihal Vihar.

Police said Cambodia served as the recruitment and training base, Chinese nationals supplied and configured SIMBOX hardware, a Pakistani handler facilitated funding and IMEI manipulation, while Nepal operated as the remote control centre directing activities in India.

In total, police seized 22 SIMBOX devices and 120 foreign SIM cards of China Mobile. Technical analysis revealed over 5,000 compromised IMEI numbers and nearly 20,000 SIM cards embedded within the network. Officials estimated thousands of victims across multiple states were cheated of around Rs 100 crore through this foreign-controlled infrastructure.